Marian devotion" "
In the heart of France Marian devotion has immemorial roots and is still expressed in the form of hundreds of pilgrimages throughout May In France, the tradition of devotion to the Virgin originated many centuries ago. When Pope Urban II came to announce the first crusade in the eleventh century, he was astonished by the large number of churches, chapels, abbeys and monasteries dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Even today we can count some 30,000 of them. In Paris alone there are thirty or so churches dedicated to “Notre-Dame”. The cathedral of Notre-Dame itself is of course the most important, with some 10 million visitors each year. The most deeply felt solemnity for Marian devotion is August 15, the feast of the Assumption, with the traditional procession whose origins go back, it seems, to 1637, the year in which the Virgin became patron of France. In that year king Louis XIII consecrated the country to the Virgin Mary with a vow, following the numerous defeats she had suffered in the course of the thirty years war: he offered a new high altar to the cathedral. Ever since then, a Marian procession is held in the capital, as well as in other cities and towns of the kingdom, on 15 August. This tradition is still very much alive in numerous places. The Marian month of May is also celebrated in rural areas. Thus, it has been the custom since 1600 to go on pilgrimage to Quintin, in Brittany, a little town of some 3,000 inhabitants, each second Sunday after Easter. In that year, the church was destroyed by a fire, but the reliquary that contained a fragment of the Virgin’s girdle, given to the lord of the town during a crusade, was miraculously saved. Ever since then, the reliquary has been the object of veneration by the faithful, especially by women who want to have a child. This year, almost a thousand pilgrims took part in the rite of “forgiveness” presided over by Bishop Louis Fruchaud of Saint-Brieuc. In the diocese of Puy-en-Velay, at the heart of France, a hundred or so pilgrims go on foot from the cathedral to the statue of Notre-Dame de France on 31 May. Moreover, throughout May, the faithful gather to recite the rosary in “assemblies” held in various parishes in the diocese. In these little towns and villages the “holy women” once lived; consecrated women, whose history goes back to the seventeenth century. They lived alone and taught the catechism and basic schooling to the local children. The last such “holy woman” died forty years ago, but the houses in which they lived are being preserved and restored. In Champagne, Bishop Gilbert Louis of Châlons has for the last two years been organizing a pilgrimage with the “Word of Life” community to another Marian sanctuary, Notre-Dame de l’Epine. This pilgrimage dates back to the fifteenth century, following the finding of a statue of the Virgin in a bush. But of the various Marian sanctuaries that of Lourdes is the prime destination of pilgrimages in the country: six million visitors go to Lourdes each year. The month of May has its traditional events, such as the international military pilgrimage, this year with 15,000 members of the armed forces led by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Ré, or that of the Order of Malta with some 4,000 participants. In Paris, the sanctuary with the chapel of the “miraculous medal” is visited by over two million pilgrims each year. No less than two hundred pilgrimages to the chapel take place during May; that means that from 3000 to 5000 presences are registered each day. Many pilgrims acquire facsimiles of the miraculous medal that the Virgin Mary had asked be struck for Catherine Labouré, a humble nun of the order of St. Vincent de Paul. This medal, famous throughout the world, is given as a present especially by godfathers and godmothers on the occasion of baptisms; a tradition deeply rooted in France.
